Undertow: The Frog
by SurelyForth
Summary: Bryce Guerrin seeks closure with his pet frog, while Anders reflects on a lesson well learned. Prompt fill for BSN, takes place in Undertow universe.


**Note from SurelyForth: **One-hour prompt fill for the BSN site (this week's prompt: Anders' Irving hatred). Thanks to Sarah1281 for the prompt and Sandtigress for the feedback.

This, obviously, takes place in Undertow-iverse, about a month before the events of Chapter 1.

_Mild _spoilers for Witch Hunt. Credit for everything goes to BioWare.

* * *

The frog, a living replacement for his wooden frog that had gotten lost somewhere between Denerim and Vigil's Keep, was gone from its home in the solarium.

Bryce, deciding that he'd had enough of losing frogs, was coping in unusually dramatic fashion- belly down on the floor in front of the sitting room fireplace, his cheek pressed against the rug. Every now and again he would issue a long sigh, or scratch his nose. But then it was back to mourning.

This had been going on for about an hour, Brand and Anders flanking him on the floor, trying to read but mostly exchanging periodic and concerned glances.

"So maybe Hoppity is under one of the bookcases," Brand nudged him. "Do you want to look again?"

_Sigh._

"Hoppity is afraid of the dark, Brand," Anders flicked the bottom of Bryce's shoe. "You know, I bet he made it outside and just went back to his pond."

Bryce shifted a bit.

"Why would he _leave_?"

"Well, maybe he missed his mother. Maybe there's a pretty frog out there that he wanted to kiss," Anders fought to keep his eyes from going to Brand when he said this. "Maybe someone made him sad, so he needed his mother or his pretty frog."

Bryce sat up, his eyes troubled.

"We should find him and tell him to not be sad!"

_Of course we should._

"Well, we need to start following in his...hops, then," Anders leaned forward. "That will require _thinking_ like a frog. Or an escapist."

"How convenient!" Brand smiled at Bryce, who was brightening by the second. "Anders just so happens to be very good at thinking like a frog. And escaping!"

"I'm Anders," Bryce was finding his feet. "And I'm escaping to find Hoppity."

It was the perfect adventure for a three year-old. A four year-old. An _almost_ four year-old. Anders stood and helped Brand up.

"Don't even _think_ you're getting out of this one," he held her hand slightly longer than he should have. "_We_ have a frog to placate."

They spent the next hour or so creeping through the hallways of the Keep, eyes searching shadows and Bryce and Anders falling behind columns and opened doors whenever they would come across someone else.

"What are you guys doing?" Garavel eyed them with suspicion. He had reason to, Anders supposed. What was more suspicious than a cat, a child and a grown man skulking down the corridor with a bemused military escort?

"I'm Anders," Bryce was the only one of them on friendly terms with the captain. "I'm escaping."

"_You're_ Anders? Where's your earring?" Garavel snorted and carried on his way, leaving Bryce open-mouthed with excitement because the _earring_.

"Maker _no_," Brand was no longer bemused, because of the _excitement_ on her son's face that turned to disappointment. Anders reached into his pocket and pulled out a scrap of vellum on which he'd jotted a note that morning, the ink still damp in some places. He pressed it first to his thumb and then pressed his thumb against Bryce's earlobe, leaving a black smudge.

"There, earring," Anders lowered his voice. "Don't tell _Brand_."

Bryce was _ecstatic_ and he stopped skulking, walking with his head angled proudly so everyone else they encountered could _see_.

Then they were outside.

"We've escaped!" He threw his arms out and turned to Anders. "Where should we go, Hoppity?"

"Hoppity!" Brand giggled. "I didn't know that _you_ were Hoppity."

"I didn't either. Well, _ribbit_," Anders looked down at Bryce. "Let's go to the pond, that's where we found him, right?"

"That's where we found _you_," he began to lead them towards the pond, his gait more _conscious_ than usual, his hands on his hips.

"I don't really walk like _that_, do I?" Anders fell into step besides Brand. She laughed again and nodded. "How embarrassing for _me_."

"It works when you're taller, it if makes you feel any better," her arm bumped his and he smiled at the ground. Obviously it _did_ make him feel better. "So why are we doing this? Herren's making him a new frog, and neither of us particularly like _handling_ the things."

"So _slimy_," Anders shuddered, then remembered how happy Bryce had been just watching the damn thing _breathe_. "Closure, maybe?"

"So you think he's just going to tell a random frog to not be sad anymore?" She asked, but he could see in her eyes she knew he _absolutely_ would. This _was_ Bryce; he was weirdly sweet like that. Well, when he wasn't inadvertently mocking Anders' _walk_.

"I think it will make him feel better," he narrowed his eyes against the sun's glare. Bryce was still ambling ahead, chattering to Pounce.

"Did I ever tell you about my first escape from the tower?" They were close to the water, the pond a sad little affair almost obscured by a skin of brilliant green algae. Following along the edge, Bryce led the procession around to the far side where they'd found Hoppity a few weeks prior.

"That was the 'Apprentice Anders ruins it for everyone by jumping into Lake Calenhad during exercises' one, yes?" She punctuated this with a cheeky grin.

"It's not _my_ fault that they overreacted. Besides, we spent half the time just getting our sad _cave_ eyes adjusted to the sunlight then most of us would be useless all afternoon because of migraines, but I digress," he stopped, as Bryce had came to a halt in front of them.

"I found Hoppity!" He dropped to his knees. "You can stop pretending now, Anders!"

"Well, the truth was that I escaped because I was feeling homesick," Bryce was now talking to the frog at the pond's edge, his voice too low to make out. "I was young, and missed my family."

"No pretty girls you wanted to kiss?" Brand nudged his arm sympathetically.

"A whole _world_ of pretty girls I wanted to kiss, pretty girls who didn't think I was a troublemaker just because the Knight-Commander and the First Enchanter told them I was," he smirked. "Although, admittedly, the reputation came to serve me well once I _grew_ into it."

"Did you make it home?"

He shook his head slowly, trying not to think about how exhausted and overwhelmed he'd been when he finally made it to a settlement. He had no money, no contacts and only the sopping wet apprentice robes that were on his back. If it wasn't for a kind merchant, he'd have spent his few weeks of freedom in a cave of hidden in a barn somewhere.

"Didn't make it home and by the time I got dragged back to the tower, Irving had taken all of my belongings and sealed the air vent near my bed."

"To prevent you from escaping again?"

Anders felt his lips pull down at the corners.

"The vent led directly outside, I could see the sunlight from my bed. The first night I was there, angry and scared, I heard something _mumbling_ at me. It was a crow, a massive fellow with a white chest. I guess the apprentice before me had fed it scraps and gave it baubles, because it definitely expected _something_," he nudged at the ground with his toe, wondering why he was telling this story, as sad as it made him. "I offered a single copper that he snatched away and then he…just _watched_ me, like he expected something else. So I started talking to him, and he, uh…"

"Listened?"

"It _felt_ like he did," Anders shrugged. "I would talk and he would watch and he was the only thing in the whole damned place that didn't hate me or think I was some _weirdo_ for being so miserable. I named him Scout and gave him quite the collection of baubles, stuff I found around the tower, and I would talk to him at least once a day."

"Until Irving sealed your vent," she looked incredibly sad for young apprentice Anders. "Maybe he didn't realize?"

"He did," his eyes darted away from her, away from Bryce, and he allowed himself a rare moment of genuine self-pity. "He told me that he did it on purpose, to teach me a lesson. 'Your actions have consequences, Anders. You need to learn that. ' And _I_ thought having to go back was punishment enough, but of course _he_ didn't see it that way. He kept tightening the noose and expecting me to thrive with less and less to enjoy, and no _hope_ for more. He just expected me to shrivel up and quit caring…to accept my fate without question."

She remained silent as they watched Bryce carefully scoop up a frog that was definitely _not_ Hoppity and plant a kiss on its head, their faces twitching in mutual disgust. He then set the frog down and it leapt away from him, diving into a clutch of tall grass further down the bank.

"Bye, Hoppity! Don't be sad!"

He wiped his mouth on the edge of his tunic, no longer Anders but a little boy who'd done his part to indulge someone else's happiness.

"So I take it no closure for you and Scout?"

Anders' lips twitched in a wry smile.

"No, I never saw him again," he sighed and touched her elbow, Bryce already having run back past them, Pounce at his side. "But things worked out for me in the end. I've got almost everything I could want at the Vigil, and sometimes I get to pretend to be a _frog_."

"See, you _did_ learn something from Irving- how _not_ to treat a child if you want him to give a damn about what you _want_ him to give a damn about."

"That's very _confusing_," he laughed, though, as Bryce came leaping back to catch each of them by their hands so he could walk in the middle, rambling about lunch and Pounce and _Brand, would you nap with me today? _"How convenient, those are _all _things that I give a damn about!"

Bryce giggled at _damn_, Brand rolled her eyes at _both_ of them, and Anders thought about thanking Irving for tightening that noose. Without it, he may have become comfortable and missed right out on _this_.


End file.
